


can't we just go back to page one (and start all over)

by orphan_account



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Team Lads, farewell brownman!!, there's probably a lot of swearing sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-21
Updated: 2015-04-21
Packaged: 2018-03-25 02:39:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3793597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>it is his last day and of course, they will not allow him to be alone as he says goodbye to all this.</em>
</p><hr/><p>as ray prepares to say goodbye to the past three years of his life and look to his future, he is relieved to find he has his lads to help him through.</p>
            </blockquote>





	can't we just go back to page one (and start all over)

**Author's Note:**

> **real quick warning** : monty oum is VERY briefly mentioned in the early stages of this story. if this makes you uncomfortable at all, please don't read. thank you!

it is his last day.

it is his last day and his desk is empty. he has said his goodbyes to his friends, packed up his desk and left nothing but heartbreak in his wake. he will be back next week — but this feels too much like _goodbye_ , nothing like he wants.

it is his last day and as he wonders through the office he is oh-so familiar with, he feels like a ghost. there is still so many memorabilia lain around, relating to him. it feels like a shrine, or perhaps a grave. he is sure that if he looks to his left, he will see a motion-capture suit walking into the night, translucent as it disappears into nothing.

it is his last day and he is not ready to say goodbye, but he is ready to leave. to begin the next chapter of his life and forget the dark hole of his worst days. he had been lost but now he is found, still haunting familiar hallways and silent in his expeditions. it is late, and it is his last day — he should be gone by now, off to begin again; but he cannot leave. it feels too final, and he knows when he walks out those doors nothing will be the same.

it is his last day and it has been a long day.

it is his last day and it has gone too quick.

it is his last day and he wants to go back. he wants to go back to being twenty three, when texas was new and exciting; when he was still finding his feet and he wants to go back and start all over. he is not happy here now, he knows — but he had been, once. he remembers being happy to load up  the same games day after day after day because _this was everything he’d ever wanted_ , but somewhere along the way, he had lost the stars in his eyes. he had grown, and found himself wondering why he did the same thing _over_ and _over_ and _over_ and just hoping for a different outcome. that is insanity, he knows.

it is his last day and he is not alone now, nor is he ever. there is always tina, always only two steps behind. but it is not tina that is waiting for him, no. she is at home, streaming one of her favorite little indie games. she is waiting for him, and he wants to relieve her. tell her to soothe her worries because they are going to be _happy_ now, that they don’t need to worry. that it will all be worth it in the end.

it is his last day and of course, they will not allow him to be alone as he says goodbye to all this.

—

he remembers first talking to michael.

they had been younger then, still growing into their bodies and finding their feet. they had gravitated towards each other, a moth to flame or perhaps opposite magnets. they had been the perfect fit way back when, before everything else. they were best friends, trading snarky comments over shitty internet connections and sharing humorous tales over skype calls in the dead of night.

but of course, things changed. they’ve grown now, perhaps even grown apart — they’re still friends, and he thinks they always will be, but they are not what they had once been. that is partly his fault, he knows. his inability to throw himself alongside michael into any which situation, instead choosing to hang back and quietly observe. not unsocial, just _different_ social. not michael’s type of social.

they’ve always had little inside jokes, and he has collected them to keep them all safe within the hollow concave of his ribcage. they are smothering his heart, his lungs and he cannot quite breathe through them, but he refuses to let go. he has always been too stubborn, holding onto things long after they’ve left him in the dust. they used to be _better friends_ , but he remembers. remembers being best friends. remembers snorting into his comforter in the dead of night, trying not to wake his parents with his laughter. remembers michael’s quiet reassurances of _i’m not going to forget about you in texas, jerkoff_. he remembers, because he can’t _not_.

it’s michael who finds him first.

he is standing in the bungalow, stood in the doorway of jon’s office when it happens. he can’t help but smile at all the t-shirt designs he knows he’s inspired — it’s still a source of annoyance for him, a small part of the reason for his recent withdrawal from commentaries, but it’s nostalgic and he misses the days of _i mean, YOLO, right?_ and coming up with shitty superhero alter egos.

“ _you’re still here,_ ” michael murmurs. he doesn’t react at all, keeps his back to michael and instead wonders if team better friends was ever going to get a shirt. “ _you know, you’re gonna be fine, ray._ ”

and he knows. the sixty or so thousand followers on twitch and however many subscribers he has are more than enough proof of that, but he is afraid. he is still a little boy, haunted by the possibilities of _what could have been_. he wonders that if he and michael never decided to join achievement hunter what would have become of them. “ _yeah, i know_.” he says softly, voice still too loud in the silence of the bungalow.

michael’s long and still-somehow familiar fingers wind about his wrist, and in only a moment, he’s being forced to stare into michael’s worried chestnut stare. “ _hey,_ ” michael grins. “ _remember when we used to be better friends?_ ”

he does. god, he remembers. he has always remembered too much about michael, remembers the jealousy and embarrassment and infatuation. he likes this better, likes being equals with his longest friend — he spent too many years seeing michael jones as nothing more than a galaxy, and he likes being on the same level as rage quit jones. it feels right. it feels like closure.

“ _fuck that. you’re still my best friend, asshole. can’t get rid of me that easily._ ”

michael’s grin grows at that, and he stares at his friend and his ridiculous dimples and all those goddamn freckles and feels nothing but contentment.

—

wherever michael is, gavin is never too far behind.

he remembers gavin. there is not a specific moment he remembers, not really – the three years the two of them have spent together have blended together into a kaleidoscope of colors and feelings and sounds, indistinguishable but still breathtaking.

gavin finds him second.

he had been expecting the other lad.

gavin’s computer is the only one still powered on when he arrives, red bull cans and half-drank cups of coffee strewn across the desk. it’s typical of gavin, the sight chaotic and very reminiscent of the aftermath of a bomb hit. the sight is almost comforting, but gavin is nowhere to be seen and he can’t help but wonder where his partner in crime has gotten to.

he settles down at his empty desk, though he knows it won’t stay this way for long. he doesn’t know who’s going to seize his desk, but they can’t afford to have an empty desk anywhere in this building and shit, it sounds petty and selfish but he doesn’t want to be replaced.

but he must, he knows this.

knows it too well.

“ _bloody hell, ray, you’re still here?_ ” he hears gavin before he sees him in the reflection of his monitor, and he jumps in surprise before spinning around to face his foreign friend. the room is still dark, the only light coming from gavin’s monitor and it casts a ghostly glow on the blonde’s face, highlighting the dark undersides of sea-foam eyes and the frownlines that are slowly but surely making the hollows of gavin’s cheeks their home.

he looks different now, to before. he looks older.

and god, he sees it in gavin. he sees what made him consider leaving rooster teeth in the first place, the recognition of the motonony of their day-to-day routines; it isn’t every day they film an rt life and it’s not every day they film something that everybody honestly enjoys. it’s just more and more of the same crap and fuck, it nearly drove him insane. and he knows it’s driving gavin up the wall. neither have really been the type for routine, but it’s different for gavin: it’s obvious that burnie is all-but grooming him to become the next head of rooster teeth when all the originals retire, and they aren’t going to let their little british import leave as easily as they had said goodbye to him.

but he just smiles, standing up from his chair and gently rolling it back under his desk.

( _it’s not your desk any more_ , he has to tell himself. _this isn’t your chair, this isn’t your office, none of this is yours—_ )

“ _i’m about to head home and grab some chow_ ,” he says. he’s lying. he doesn’t think he could eat if he tried. he’d probably end up throwing it all up if he tried anyway.

gavin frowns then, and he finds that he misses the other lad’s warmth. “ _but tina’s streaming right now, isn’t she? are you walking back to your apartment complex?_ ”

for a moment, he wonders how gavin knows this. tina hasn’t really gotten to know any of his co-workers, not really, but he remembers that not everyone is as anti-social as he and his girlfriend. some actually pay attention to the people around him, and he wishes he were surprised to find that gavin is one of these people.

“ _yeah, i am._ ” he answers after a few beats, reaching up and cracking the joints in his shoulders. he pretends not to notice the way gavin cringes at the sound.

there’s another silence now, hard and strange. he can’t remember the last time he has been silent whilst alone with gavin, and he wonders why – he has certainly been quiet with the rest, but there has always been something about gavin that has been different, something that made him want to try.

maybe it’s all the fucking money. he wants some of that, after all.

“ _c’mon, michael’s taking me home after this. just wait a little longer and you can come with us,_ ” and shit, gavin looks cautious at making the offer, as if expecting him to deny it. he wants to blame the brit, to remind him that _nothing’s going to change_ , he’ll still be x-ray and gavin will still be vav, but he’ll just be around a little less but the words get stuck in his throat and he can only manage a nod.

gavin smiles then, the gesture weak and almost forced. “ _you know, ray, i’m going to miss you_.”

and this all feels strangely heartfelt, coming from the two self-confessed insensitive members of achievement hunter. it’s not them, but at the same time, it feels _right_. “ _i’m not dying, vav._ _you’ll see me again._ ”

he remembers filming his final minecraft lets play, gavin’s scream of _we’re never going to bloody see him again!_ and there is no mistaking the guilt that tugs at the bottom of his gut, resilient in its’ attack. the past year, in particular, he has slowly been withdrawing himself from the achievement hunter crew and now he is left looking at the damage he has left in his wake, the devastation he will leave five of his closest friends to recover from on their own.

“ _you’ll be okay, won’t you? you’ll be happy?_ ”

and there’s the million dollar question, isn’t it? he’s leaving because twitch makes him happy, so much happier than rooster teeth has made him for the last six months or so. it’s been hard, sorting out the rooster teeth twitch debacle and it’s been taxing, arguing with geoff and matt about his lack of energy in commentaries. he’s happy here, yes— is incredibly lucky and he knows this, knows people would die for this job, but _this isn’t what he wants_. not any more, at least.

not for a long time.

twitch makes him happy. gives him the freedom he apparently so desperately needs. the people are kinder and it gives him the chance to actually connect with his fans, instead of dreading to look through the comments on anything he puts out. he’s going to be happy, and achievement hunter will be fine; they have to be, all of them. there’s no other choice, and they all understand it.

but it’s going to be hard.

it’s going to be _so_ hard. for him more than the others, because even if he is so ready for this next stage of his life, he is used to playing off of other people in commentaries. having the chat is nice and it’s a head start that very many new streamers don’t have, but he’s used to having tangible people only a few steps away — he doesn’t know if he can carry a stream on his own, even with tina hanging over his shoulder.

after a few beats, he inhales deeply. “ _yeah, gav,_ ” he’s not sure if he’s telling the truth quite yet. “ _of course. i wouldn’t be doing this if i didn’t think it was the right decision._ ”

gavin smiles.

he pretends he can’t see the longing of the other lad.

“ _come on, vav. let’s go home._ ”

—

it is his last day and he is saying goodbye.

it is his last day, but he will be okay. maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow or even the day after, but the day will come where he will be. and he knows this, but it’s hard right now; but he will push through, with the help of tina and the grumps and all of his fellow streamers—

and, he thinks, with the help of his lads.

it might be goodbye, and it may be his last day, but it will be okay.

he will be back next week. he has lines to record on tuesday. a play pals recording to crash with geoff on wednesday. a lunch date with tina and jon on thursday.

it may be his last day, but he is not quite done yet.

and he smiles. says goodbye to gavin as the lanky man clambers out of the car and disappears into the waiting house. he will see gavin on tuesday, and he will see gavin on wednesday — this is not goodbye, not yet. x-ray and vav will live on, whether it be through animation or breathtaking fan art or even shitty fanfiction. this is not goodbye, and he thinks he will never have to say goodbye to his partner in crime.

and he smiles. thanks michael for the ride when the elevator gets to his floor. he should go, he should leave — but he will only see michael on wednesday next week. he doesn’t want to leave. he wants to go back to new york and having a best friend just down the coast. he wants to stay. but he leaves, says goodbye and disappears off to his apartment, all-too aware of michael’s eyes on his back.

before the doors close and michael is whisked away, he hears the other man shout, “ _i’m proud of you, jerkoff!_ ”

today was his last day.

tomorrow will be his first.

and finally, ray thinks he is ready.


End file.
